In early September, mysterious handprints, printed on colored paper, began appearing in the hallways of West Chicago Community High School. Since then, both students and staff have engaged in ongoing discussions, speculating about their origin and significance.
These paper handprints, which are surrounded by a circle, were placed around the school last month, presumably after school hours.
It turns out they were designed to spark interest among students and teachers in Operation Snowball, an organization focused on preventing substance abuse.
“When my friends or anyone sees them, they say, ‘Oh, what is that? Because I’ve been seeing them everywhere.’ My handprints are to promote Snowball and catch people’s attention. It’s meant to get the word out, like ‘Oh, it’s for Snowball,’ and keep people interested by wondering, ‘What is Snowball?’” senior Eilynne Hernandez, one of the directors of Snowball, said.
Many of the paper hands were spread across the school: outside classrooms, in the library, and above water fountains. However, a hand is not the first image that comes to mind when thinking of Snowball. The Snowball logo traditionally features an “O” and an “S,” intertwined, with the “O” designed to resemble a snowball.
Where, then, does the handprint fit in?
WCCHS’ newest logo represents building relationships.
“If you look in the center of the hand, there’s a circle, like in the palm of the hand, and that’s our original Snowball logo. It represents the person as an individual. Then you have rings extending out on the fingers. The fingers represent the message spreading out,” Christina Sladek, a co-sponsor of Snowball, said.
The circles are key to understanding the connections that Snowball seeks to create.
“Those outer circles represent the people in your life. There’s your inner circle—your close friends and family. Then there’s the outer circle—people you have class with or see regularly but aren’t as close to. The idea is how you can spread that message to those individuals,” Sladek said.
Operation Snowball is a long-running organization at West Chicago Community High School. Each fall, Snowball recruits student and teacher leaders to be part of the program, spending months training for a winter retreat, where other students are invited to participate.
“You’ve gotta come to this. It’s really good. I made friends from just a two-day retreat, and even after, we stayed close. For me, it means connections. It helped me grow closer to friends I already had and also make a bunch of new ones, which is really cool,” Michaela Miller, another director of Snowball and a fellow senior, said.
